from Act II, Scene 1 of the English opera The Ballad of Baby Doe by Douglas Moore

Libretto: John Latouche

Role: Elizabeth Doe (Baby Doe), the wife of a miner, Harvey Doe

Voice Part: soprano       Fach: lyric coloratura

Setting: balcony outside the Governor's Ball at the Windsor Hotel, Denver, Colorado, 1893

Synopsis: At the ball, Baby Doe and her mother are treated as second-class citizens by the other women at the ball. They go out on to the balcony to get away from the snobbery and Baby Doe declares that the reason that other women look down upon her is because they wish they had what she had. What she has is the true love of Horace Tabor, which she goes on to say is the most valuable thing that she could own.